Category Archives: Invierno

Par for the course

By nopasanada | Published: January 3, 2011

“I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape – the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn’t show.” ~Andrew Wyeth

Did I ever tell you about the job interview where I cried at the end because I knew I was going to say yes and I also knew that I was rendering myself to a life inside of a snow globe? No? Well that’s pretty much the story. Then there was the first time it snowed after moving back to said snow globe where I – shocker! – cried the second the flakes stuck to the ground. I wandered over to my mother’s office and asked how I would manage to make it home in this with a grand gesture to the window. Peg was all, “Uh, you drive” and then went back to typing away. Meanwhile I panicked and went home at 2:30 so I could park my car nice and early because, you guys? I was afraid of snow.

I am from Upstate New York and I was pretty sure that snow was the first sign of the Apocalypse.

It’s gotten better since then. Oh how it has. I embrace the snow. It’s par for the course up here and it is something to not be afraid of but to welcome with open arms lest you want to spend the rest of your life debilitated by nature. I don’t mind the snow, it’s par for the course. It is what I signed up for in exchange for more money and a fantastic job and living near my family and all of those things that one takes for granted. There’s also the added bonus of having it be the least terrifying on the natural disaster scale. The earth won’t move along a fault line and New York State won’t end up floating out by itself in the Atlantic. It requires only the use of a shovel or a snow blower and mittens. You’re never required to board up the windows of your house due to wind. Blizzards won’t force you to spend an evening listening to sirens while hunkered down in your basement. Snow is pretty. No two flakes are the same and while watching it fall from the sky you are generally overcome by awe rather than debilitating fear. It’s a beautiful thing.

In my whole “I shall enjoy the cold white fluff” campaign I started snow shoeing. I went out on the golf course in Saratoga last week and traipsed around the fairway and through sand traps and did a quick jump over a small water hazard. In the summer these are all things I shake my fist at as I try to get my ball to the green but come winter I frolic and traverse each happily. It feels like the world is at my fingertips out there by myself, just wandering. Don’t tell, but I do love it here just a bit. How could I not?

Also posted in Fotografias | 6 Comments

February

By nopasanada | Published: February 27, 2008

“Winter is nature’s way of saying, “Up yours.”" ~Robert Byrne

Everyone had that kid in high school. You know, the one that was teased for being geeky and really short. Of course he eventually grows up and his formerly geeky ways manifest into some sort of genius. And now he’s a millionaire and ready to hand out personalized cans of whoop ass to those who teased him mercilessly for being short. He shows up each year for impromptu reunions, still short but now with his very own yacht and super enhanced ass-kicking mechanism.

February is like that kid. Always and forever short but now prepared to wreak havoc on every poor soul who once uttered how useless and possibly annoying the entire month seems to be. February obviously didn’t stop to think that maybe people have been mean to it because it goes around being all violent and kicking people in the head once a year. Perhaps that is why the average person gives it such a fond farewell: Because it will be gone and no longer around to fuck with anyone’s emotions. It’s like it makes up for it’s size by having a larger than life attitude, full of eye rolling, hands on hips and that stupid neck thing to show that it means business despite it’s diminutive stature.

I tell myself to be nice to it and not to egg it on. If I am kind then maybe it will be kind right back. But nope. Misery loves company and February is a miserable little shit who apparently didn’t get enough love as a child. No wonder that come Friday, I will be celebrating its departure with balloons, sparkly confetti and the brightest god damn streamers this side of the Mississippi. And wine. God forbid I forget the wine.

Also posted in Sucks like a vacuum | 15 Comments

When in Rome

By nopasanada | Published: January 6, 2008

“There is a privacy about it which no other season gives you…. In spring, summer and fall people sort of have an open season on each other; only in the winter, in the country, can you have longer, quiet stretches when you can savor belonging to yourself.” ~Ruth Stout

My piss poor behavior in the presence of snow would lead one to believe that I’ve spent the majority of my life in Maui. Actually if that were true, the snow would be met with a little awe and wonder instead of pure disdain. The snow falls and my mood plummets to the darkest depths of despair while I think about the scraping and the shoveling and my inability to drive 70 mph without slamming into a guardrail. The first time it snowed I hung up on my mother and had to leave work four hours early so that I would have ample time to try and not die on my way home. All the while muttering, “I hate this fucking place and this shit” for 11 miles. I am such a breath of fresh air some days, I know.

At some point over the past weeks though my begrudging attitude towards the fluffy white stuff has abated to a mild dislike. I actually hummed the other day while shoveling my car out and didn’t complain once when it was 4 degrees even though I was sure that once I returned home, I’d be missing my nipples. Still! All was good. I suppose a brief “Come to Jesus” discussion with myself about how whining is unbecoming on a woman in her mid-20’s helped me to accept my fate. I live in Upstate New York where it will snow for five months straight. No amount of yelling or throwing up the middle finger towards drivers, who find turn signal usage superfluous during a snowstorm, will really change my current situation.

My parents are from the deep-south and if they can deal with snow then I surely can go five months without shrill whining about it. Though I think right now they’re debating whether or not to get my DNA tested for I have taken my whole ‘acceptance’ thing to a whole new level: I am OBSESSED with snowshoeing. It’s like when I spent hours trying to find my new camera I am now spending hours a day reading about how to HIKE in the fucking snow. I am so obsessed with the sport that a frown crept upon my face when I learned that it would be 60 degrees on Tuesday because then the snow would melt. The snow cannot melt it must be here and readily available for me to trek through. In fact I’m currently sitting here getting a little giddy (hence the rambling) about the next big snowstorm. Who cares about snow emergencies and digging my vehicle out of three feet of snow when the trails will be covered?? I told my mother all of this with such enthusiasm that she congratulated me and informed me that it would be a cold day in Hell before she ever went out there with me but is quite happy that I’m no longer blaming her for ubiquitous snowstorms and am instead facing them with joy.

What can I say? ‘When in Rome…’ and all that jazz. My new shoes arrive on Friday and I really couldn’t possibly be more thrilled.

Also posted in The object of my obsession, This side of the Hudson | 13 Comments

The bane of my existence

By nopasanada | Published: December 13, 2007

“Winter is nature’s way of saying, ‘Up yours.’” ~Robert Byrne

I got absolutely nothing done today. Every time I would open an email or clean off my desk or reach down to grab a pair of sandals that were still under my desk from like July; I would casually look outside and my chest would start heaving at the sight of the snow. There is a very funny thought in the minds of others that because I live and am from Upstate NY then of course I can handle driving in snow. Do I have experience watching others drive in snow? Yes, yes I do. Do I have experience driving myself 10 miles in roughly six inches of snow with fattest, fluffiest, most blindingly white flakes known to man? No, no I do not. Hence the white knuckled driving and need to take deep breaths and the panicked phone calls to my parents apprising them of the seven whole dollars in my bank account that they could totally have in the event of my untimely death.

If you ever want to become religious, drive in snow. You’ll start believing in God real quick when driving through snow as you think of things to ask for forgiveness on in exchange for making it two more miles. Today it was forgiveness for that time I called my middle school librarian a ‘fucking bitch’ and the time I stole a pack of lifesavers from Hannaford.

Also posted in Sucks like a vacuum, This side of the Hudson | 16 Comments